African musicians have been adopting and adapting Western popular music for decades and there's endless pleasure to be had exploring the back pages of Nigerian funk-rock and Ghanaian disco. If you're going to WOMAD this year, you'll be hearing the…
As a politician one of the most common topics I get asked to talk about is leadership. Not party leadership (though that used to come up a fair bit!) but the principles of leadership. What makes a good leader, what…
The Unitary Plan debate has flared up again as Council and submitters prepare to present their cases before the Independent Hearings Panel into which zones go where across Auckland. ¶ We've seen reports and commentary on a meeting in East Auckland…
When the promoters of the Splore festival asked me to put together another Listening Lounge talk programme for this year's festival, they asked whether I had a dream guest I'd like to bring in. I did. And I'm pleased to…
On Friday night, I closed a long, occasionally difficult but undoubtedly valuable discussion thread spawned by my post about incidents of sexual harassment at the Laneway festival. There were two main reasons for doing so. ¶ The first was that the…
Although I'm fond of the place, I hadn't paid a great deal of attention to the wrangle over the closing to motor traffic of the access road to the summit of Mt Eden. ¶ The car ban has been discussed for…
Matthew Hooton has a new theory of the Labour party (NBR: paywalled). It goes like this: The scary-sounding “extreme left,” fresh from suiciding the Alliance, have invaded the Labour Party with the intent of murdering it from within, with the…
With one thing or another, including some challenging family stuff and a death in my peer group, I had a rough week and wound up neither communicating or sleeping well. Speechless, sleepless and exhausted. I woke at 5am today and…
The Zika Virus seems to have come out of nowhere to be declared a World Health Organisation Public Health Emergency of International Concern on 1 February 2016, after a substantial spike in cases of microcephaly and Guillain-Barré syndrome were reported…
The music post here is usually a break from politics, but I was amused this morning by Prime Minister John Key's declaration that he would be forsaking Waitangi tomorrow for somewhere "festive and unconflicted" to spend Waitangi Day – because it…
A Māori politician once said to me "our people will march to parliament for the foreshore and seabed, land rights, water rights and whatever else is going, but they never pull on their marching boots for our kids." ¶ We certainly…
In the midst of a very good article over at The Spinoff this week - the Top 50 NZ works of non-fiction as selected by a panel of indigenous experts - there was one line that leapt out. "There are…
Hello, I’m Rob Salmond and this is Polity on Public Address. Welcome. ¶ I’ll be blogging here about politics most of all, but with a dose of sports, parenting, and miscellany thrown in. I’m really grateful to Russell for sharing his…
Earlier this week I saw that the violent misogyny website Return of Kings were planning global meetups. There were set locations, narrow time windows and even a password, straight out of a corny sixties spy movie. I laughed and told…
I was standing watching Beach House's spellbinding performance at Laneway on Monday when I thought about how remarkable it is that this annual new music festival has become so much about women. Beach House's Victoria Le Grand was commanding the…
The last, last Laneway at Silo Park. Ever. Pinky promise. ¶ Auckland turned on a scorcher. We went early, and consequently ran out of steam before the bigger night acts, which is a trap for the, something, generation. ¶ For a more…
It’s pretty rare that I pay to see a movie twice but along with Mad Max: Fury Road the new Star Wars sequel was totally worth it! To be fair I was already a big enough fan to binge-watch the…
As readers know, Labour leader Andrew Little has announced a policy for three free years of post-school education. As a person who helped a little with preparing for that launch, my own views on the policy won’t be a surprise.…
One of the vexing things about liking new music is that you're supposed to stop doing it after A Certain Age. Or, at least, to transition to something more age-appropriate. Sure, I can throw the bangers at you here, but…
As a friend of mine observed yesterday, backdowns are gold for political journalists. The stories write themselves: the government (or indeed, any other party) got it wrong and is now crawling back and hoping no one notices. Therefore: BUSTED! ¶ And…
Last month, I was very fortunate to accompany Andrew Little as he traveled for five days of meetings in Washington and New York. ¶ The trip was to assist Andrew in his preparation to become Prime Minister. For many years, opposition…
I'm still not tired of the continuing flow of interesting Bowie things filling social media, and this is one of the best. Bowie played the annual Bridge School Benefit Concert in 1996. The clip below really comes to life with…
The Ventolin inhaler is a reason I am not dead. ¶ Ventolin is a reliever medication for asthma delivered in a Metered Dose Inhaler or MDI, and globally it is one of the most commonly used treatments for any medical condition.…
It wasn't television, it was radio being made. And that is a virtue. The debut episode of Checkpoint with John Campbell went out yesterday and while there are still a few moving parts to be bedded in, it seems clear…
There is, of course, already a discussion thread here devoted to David Bowie and his passing – and I had intended to lead with something different for the regular Friday Music post. But then I noticed this post on Dangerous Minds.…